Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick: “Mr. Chairman, this is about the drugs in America that have devastated America, its families, its children, and its…”

“Mr. Chairman, this is about the drugs in America that have devastated America, its families, its children, and its communities. If we have a supplemental before us, the first of the 21st century, and we do, that is funded by $1.7 billion tax dollars to give to Colombia, the country that sends 90 percent of the cocaine to this country, that sends over 60 percent of the heroin to this country, we are all saying, yes, we must do something with that supply, we must decrease that supply, but what we are also saying is that all those tons of cocaine and heroin that are in the American communities now, that we must in this supplemental, the first of the 21st century, allow money for treatment. Treatment on demand. Everyone who is addicted to drugs is not ready for treatment; but those who are ready for treatment on demand, we must make it available to them. In my district there is a 6-month waiting list for an addicted person who wants treatment today, not 6 months from now, when their families are more deteriorated, when the community is more deteriorated. Today, on demand.”